What Could Endanger The Markets In 2010

What could cause problems in 2010, these are all IFs. Pays to keep track. If Bernanke gets itchy and push down 10-year US Treasury yields again, that could put more oomph to the already excessive liquidity in the system. Bernanke could be scared into doing so if jobless numbers do not show signs of improvement. The funds will try to play the liquidity game yet again, piling into crude oil, gold and this could really create a swift liquidity bubble again.

Japan is the best bet for calamity in 2010. Things may suddenly turn focus on their huge fiscal measures and their imbalances with respect to their public debt. Already the public debt is at a staggering 225 per cent of GDP. What could start the cascade is a big dip in the value of the yen, which may require stabilisation by raising interest rates. Any kind of rates rise will push debt service costs up the roof. The country will flip from deflation to early bouts of hyperinflation. The yen may crash to 130 yen to the dollar ... which will wreck their bonds market but actually sustain interest in Japanese exporters.

China may find that it is the only engine for growth, and shouldering global demand alone may reach its peak. Wild credit growth can mask the weakness of its export model for a while but only at the price of an asset bubble. Beijing must hit the brakes this year or store up serious trouble. What will Beijing do? Prick the asset bubble, the shares will also tumble, and its effects will be felt all across emerging markets.

The EU could be placed under attack as some nations complain bitterly for having to shoulder the weak ones. The weak ones complain that they need to revive their country's employment and wants the Euro much weaker and rates a lot lower. When rich nations spending power is under threat, the union may start to wobble. Rallies and protests may rage across Europe.

These are all IFs, but they could emerge as realities swiftly, hence its best to be on our toes.


p/s photos: Zhang Zhiyi

Important View On Dubai World Factor In Equity Strategy

Well, just as swiftly foreign money came into emerging markets, just as swiftly will they leave, and not even on something direct. An indirect scare out of Dubai seems to be enough reason to take the chips from the table. On Wednesday, Dubai World, the government investment company behind some of the emirate's most ambitious projects, said it was seeking to delay repayment on a tranche of its debt. The company has $60bn of liabilities from its various companies including Nakheel, the property firm behind the Palm Jumeirah, the world's biggest artificial island, and the Nakheel Tower, the world's tallest building at 1km high. It also owns DP World, the ports operator that bought P&O Ferries. Nakheel is due to make a $3.52bn Islamic bond repayment, plus charges, on December 14.

Traders feared that the request for a six-month standstill was a sign that the Dubai Government was struggling with its other debts – and that the full impact of the financial crisis globally may not yet be over. British bank stocks, that are among the most exposed in the world to the Middle East, were hard-hit. Royal Bank of Scotland slumped 7.75pc, Lloyds Banking Group lost 5.75pc and HSBC fell 4.4pc – all three are among nine banks who were book runners on an outstanding $5.5bn syndicated loan to Dubai World in June 2008. HSBC's interim accounts showed that the bank had a $15.9bn exposure to the whole of the United Arab Emirates.

The concerns for UK banks also hit sterling, which fell to its weakest point in a month against the euro and a basket of currencies, while gilt futures leapt to a six-week high, propelled by renewed fears about credit quality. Property shares fell sharply amid concerns of a fire sale of Dubai's UK assets, which include the Grand Buildings in London. Dubai has also been a major buyer of UK property.

The risk of corporate default in Dubai clearly shows that contagion risks have not disappeared and that perhaps the market has turned a little complacent about risk. Foreign money flew out of emerging markets yesterday and the cost of borrowing shot up as investors sweated over the prospect of a state-owned Dubai company defaulting and sending another round of shock waves through the global banking system.

Banks in Europe and North America are heavily exposed to the Middle East, and Dubai in particular, with its $80 billion of debt. The cost of borrowing money increased sharply with the increased risk in financial markets. Credit default swap rates (CDS) rising on debt issued out of the Middle East and emerging markets rose, and borrowing costs on Dubai's five-year loan jumped to 5.4 per cent, up 2.24 per cent in two days.

If you look at the emerging nations' stock market performances it gives you a feel of how quickly Western capital will flow out of these nations on default fears. That said, we have to acknowledge that this is largely not long term funds anyway. These funds will find some obscure reasons to get out, if it wasn't this Dubai World situation, it will be some other obscure factor. Thats part and parcel of the high risk of having carry trades into your system. You can complain when they exit, but somehow the same people never seem to complain when they arrive??!! (ala Mahathir).

If nothing is resolved for Dubai World in the next few days you could expect more of the same next week. Uncertainty will breed fear, in other words. However methinks the risk of contagion is relatively low this time around - plus it came at a time when most equity markets were quite robust, and were actually looking for a reason to correct. This would be a good reason to correct - but I would have to say that its a buy on weakness this time around, rather than a "go for a few months holiday" kind of correction. I think markets should have a few more days of weakness, and a good strategy would be to slowly build up positions.

One big thing which most of the Western media have neglected is the role of Abu Dhabi/UAE in this - many seemed to just gloss over this. Abu Dhabi won't allow Dubai's state-owned companies default on debt payments as the global banking crisis limits their access to funds. Dubai and Abu Dhabi are interdependent and one can't be isolated from the other. Abu Dhabi Investment Authority is the world's largest sovereign wealth fund with assets of between $250 billion and $850 billion, according to the International Monetary Fund. The emirate owns more than 90 percent of the U.A.E.'s oil reserves, nearly 8 percent of the world's proven total.

Take all that into account, the risk of contagion and another credit crunch was low. Because seriously, the Middle East is not the engine of growth or a crucial part of the recovery we are seeing in the global economy. The sums that the affected banks will have to bear are not overly large, they can be written down safely, yes these banks' share prices will take a hit, but its nowhere as bad as the subprime situation.

p/s photo: Haruna Yabuki

Hoopla Over Maxis & Market Mood

I am happy that Maxis did not get whacked by retailers to stratospheric levels. I really think private investors have grown up a lot. They listened, they read, most of them know this Maxis is not the Maxis of old. I hope they also appreciate that the mobile penetration rate is vastly different from what it was ten years ago. I also hope they did not get fixated at the previous privatisation / sale at around RM15 (I think, I forgot). Most importantly, they refused to pay above fair value (deemed as having a properly competitive dividend yield) for what is basically a 70% dividend stock. By that, I mean they did not "take out the institutions" or gave them more gains than necessary. We all deserve a pat on the back. The players have grown up - if you lose enough money, you will learn, we all do.

What about the liquidity drain that Maxis was supposed to effect on the bourse? Yes, I have heard some selling their other shares to ready funds to buy Maxis, thankfully they have been few and far in between. Is there liquidity being soaked, yes of course, its not a small issue. A lot of funds had to rebalance their portfolio to accommodate Maxis. Due to the very tiny issue to the public, not an excessive amount of funds was tied up. In fact, the sluggish markets over the last ten days can be attributed to this liquidity being drained, or it actually scared many players into not participating in the markets owing to the fear of a possible down trending market.

So, if the US and China markets continue to behave, will the next few days be OK for local bourse? Most would believe that with Maxis out of the way, the markets should resume its uptrend to try for 1,300 ... will they be proven right. The markets have reached my target of 1,280 for the year. To me, it could overshoot that but it will be difficult to breach 1,300 this year, regardless of how well the US and China markets are performing. To conclude, the risk-reward is not particularly attractive. I have been scaling down holdings, and sticking to very selective stocks with near term catalysts only - in other words I would stay very selective and stick to diligent stock picking. As it is, I am finding it increasingly difficult to pick stocks to feature - the markets is trying to tell me something.

I do think there will another good round come January/ February 2010, but it will have to come down a bit first for that rally to occur. You cannot possibly have a good run for more than 3 months, it will over extend itself and be tired. One should always read markets like they view an athlete, they will show signs of fitness, strength, confidence, or weakness, tiredness, sluggishness etc. They way to read the signs is to monitor the top volume and top gainers, is there constant rotation or the same names, are the leaders moving with good catalysts or just simply goreng stuff. There will always be goreng stocks, the stronger they can do it, the stronger the underlying willingness of the market to participate, but when these stocks fail to attract followers, the answer is obvious. I would stick strictly with stock picking mode only and reduce mid-term or long term stocks.


p/s photos: Jessica C. (Wacoal's top model)

Where Are We Again In This Financial Crisis & Recovery?

http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2009/10/road_to_recover_1.html37875Road%20to%20Recovery%3A%20Yo%2C%20We%26rsquo%3Bre%20Good

I have posted this chart before from Paul Kedrosky's excellent site. As the chart only looks at the recovery from the aligned lows of each crisis, the first year's recovery was most pronounced, and as usual when it recovers the naysayers during each of these periods were vocal. What is more significant is that the recovery carried on into the second year just by looking at the various charts - and that to the naysayers would be unthinkable at the moment. Markets have a nice way of shocking us - are we all drilled to look at the wrong indicators? I am still thinking 10,800 to 11,000 is easy for the Dow by year end. I would term the most appropriate indicators for each of these crisis were:

a) how much cash was thrown into the system - this crisis wins it hands down
b) how widespread / global were the effects - looks about the same for all except the depression
c) how concerted was the global effort - this crisis wins hands down again
d) how did interest rates behave or were managed - the tech crisis saw Greenspan dropping rates quicker than a bullet (and was the start of the financial mayhem in properties, packaged loans, and the leveraged derivatives on those assets); this time, most of the global central banks are still keeping rates very low coupled with massive stimulus left, right and center.

As argued before, its not that the central banks want rates to be low as that will fuel the property side for the less affected countries, and indirectly push liquidity into stocks when risk aversion mood drops - but its for the greater good because corporate spending, hiring, investments in R&D are not recovering fast enough. Hence they all will tolerate a seemingly higher and hard to justify stock market valuations for the sake of the real economy. The real economy is expected to catch up to equity valuations, maybe they will, maybe they won't. But when you keep rates low enough and you have glimmers of recovery, that will set the momentum.

Are we putting ourselves into another bubble, ... yes... but this one will last some time yet. Its the making of a bubble, we are nowhere near boiling point yet.

CLSA Strategy Report

Its been some time since I have read Chris Wood's strategy pieces. I like him quite a bit and his views are worth following. He is surprisingly bullish on Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and China. I don't know enough about the Philippines, but I would rank my bullishness: 1) Indonesia 2) China 3) Malaysia 4) Thailand. Unlike Wood, I do like Thailand as well as I believe political uncertainty is the norm in Thailand.

Indonesia because of the Susilo's factor and the continued restructuring of its economy which will be a strong point in luring in long and short term foreign funds. China because of its deliberate liquidity pump priming, although I do see liquidity traps in second half of next year, it should first reveal itself in higher stocks and property prices. Malaysia because of its resource based, low rates, and this round of financial crisis did not hit private pockets that extensively (do read my piece on the stock market effects for Malaysia and how it has differed from the 90s experience).

I disagree with Wood when he said that deflation is a higher risk.

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Rally will fail - The relief rally in Wall Street-correlated world stock markets should have one push higher. But it will fail in coming months amid renewed deflationary market action, as it becomes clear to investors that the Western world faces an extended period of structurally lower growth.

Deflation risk - Deflation, not inflation, remains the predominant risk in the West, as it follows the same mix of monetarist and Keynesian policies which have caused Japan to suffer 20 years of anaemic growth. But it will take time for these “orthodox” policies to be completely discredited.

Southeast Asia's emerging markets — Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines — should offer investors some of the best returns this year, given their strong corporate earnings and low interest rates, CLSA's equity strategist said in an interview yesterday.

Investors should steer clear of Thailand and Taiwan, which are riddled with political uncertainty, Christopher Wood told Reuters. He has a "zero" weighting on Thailand for his relative return portfolio, even though the index is at a five-month high.

"I'll get more bullish on Thailand if I see more local investors buying the market. Right now, all you see are locals selling," he said. "But if local confidence comes back, then there'll be a huge buying opportunity."

Wood, who joined CLSA in 2002, was top-ranked Asian strategist in financial publication Institutional Investor's annual survey in 2005 and ranked second last year.

Wood expects China's booming stock market, which has more than trebled since the start of last year, to rise further, even though it trades at an expensive price-earnings ratio of about 50.

"A full-scale mania in China shares is inevitable unless the government becomes a lot more aggressive, more than what it's been so far," Wood said, referring to the Chinese central bank's monetary tightening measures announced on Friday.

But Wood, in Singapore for a CLSA conference, said China should instead accelerate the listing of A-shares - off-limits to all but a few foreign institutional investors - and increase the supply of listed companies.

Wood prefers stocks that cater to domestic demand, such as consumer stocks, banks and real estate, but warned that commodity stocks could falter, if the US economy slows.

In other asset classes, Wood said investors are best off buying Singapore hotels , "the biggest no-brainer in Asian real estate" as average room rates are still lower than those of international hotels.

He said investors should also buy the Singapore dollar amid a private banking boom in the city-state, adding these customers might use the Singapore dollar as a reference currency on their accounts, if they lose confidence in the US dollar.

"The Singapore dollar is a fantastic long-term currency story. It's basically cheap," Wood said. "It makes no sense for the government to try and artificially hold it down."

Investors who want to hedge risk should "short" US securitised consumer and corporate debt, as this is cheap, Wood said.Asian stocks are not overvalued, despite their recent record-breaking rallies, but could face a downturn if credit spreads rise, Wood said.

"What's overvalued to me is credit spreads, not stock markets," he said. "To me, the risk in the world is credit spreads rising, in which case, there will be collateral damage in stock markets."

His views contrast with some fund managers and strategists who have voiced concern that record-setting Asian markets, particularly China, Singapore, South Korea and Indonesia, have climbed far beyond their proper valuations. MSCI's measure of Asia Pacific stocks excluding Japan has risen about 12% so far this year, compared with an 8.4% rise in the MSCI World index over the same period.

Gold remains essential insurance for those investors who want to hedge the systemic risks caused by the increasingly panicky responses of Western policymakers to growing deflationary pressures in their debt-burdened economies. Such longer term risks include the discrediting of fiat currencies and hyperinflation.

— Reuters

p/s photos: Fasha Sandha

Where Are We In This Stock Market Rebound? - Deflation Or Reflation Trades

The key historical lesson from past U.S. recessions and severe bear markets is that the stock market tends to bottom out three to six months before the economic contraction reaches its maximum. From the recent economic figures, it is plausible that the U.S. stock market is possibly at a stage where the recession is passing its worst phase. If history is any guide, the stock market should have entered a bottoming process a few weeks back.

Cyclically-sensitive sectors and markets have outperformed as shown in my recent posts, which further signals that reflation trades could soon make a comeback. For instance, emerging markets have continued to outperform the global average. Early cyclicals, such as consumer discretionary and technology sectors, are also beginning to outperform the broad benchmark
equity index.

Finally, it seems that some segments of global financial markets are repositioning themselves for reflation trades. Commodity currencies have experienced a sharp rebound in tandem with the broad commodity price index as well as the crude oil market. In recent history, these moves have been a harbinger of a more broad-based return of the reflation trades.

The key point here is that the decline in stock prices has been the worst since the Great Depression, and has gone a long way to discounting a severe economic recession and financial fallout. Of course, at previous major bear market lows, valuations have been much better than today’s level so it is open to debate whether the worst is discounted – but we should not ignore that reflation this time around is much bigger than ever before, so P/E multiples may not need to go significantly lower than where they stand today. Monetary authorities and governments around the world are getting increasingly aggressive in combating the financial and economic hurricane, all of which means that deflation trades are very late.

The risk-reward tradeoff suggests that going forward, deflation trades are unlikely to reward investors and they should raise their exposure to stocks at the expense of bonds. All that points to a more stable market DESPITE the recent run up. It looks more solid than what I thought it was a few weeks back. A few weeks back, I tended to think it was a bull run with a chance for a 10% correction. But I have shied away from that conclusion, I do think there will be bouts of soft selling which will then attract fresh funds to reposition before launching up the next level. I see the Dow testing 9,300 sometime this year and holding. For KLCI I think 1,140 is possible.


p/s photos: Zhang Xin Yu